


Swords Cross

by Ember_Keelty



Category: Dokidoki! Precure, Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica, プリキュア | PreCure | Pretty Cure Series
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-15
Updated: 2013-07-15
Packaged: 2017-12-20 07:31:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/884627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ember_Keelty/pseuds/Ember_Keelty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Instead of Oogai, the remnants of Trump Kingdom emerge in Mitakihara, and Miki Sayaka crosses paths with an infuriatingly mysterious magical warrior.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Swords Cross

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VampirePaladin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VampirePaladin/gifts).



            Sayaka woke up sprawled on the floor with her chest aching and her head full of haze.  Had she fainted?  Why would she have fainted?  The last thing she remembered was Kyousuke telling her that his family had found a doctor who might be able to fix his hand.  She had been thrilled for him, of course, but she wasn't the sort of girl who went into fits of swooning just from a bit of excitement.  In fact, she was pretty sure that sort of girl didn't even exist outside of fiction.

            It was an American doctor, she recalled as her memories gradually trickled back to her.  Kyousuke was going to America.  She'd been less thrilled about that, and then instantly ashamed of herself.  This surgery was the miracle they had been waiting for, the one she had kept telling him to believe in whenever he'd started hinting at the darker thoughts going through his head.  What kind of selfish monster would feel sad about something that could save her friend's life?

            _"Oh, come on!"_ a voice in her head that was not her own had said to her then.  _"You're just going to let him walk away from you, after everything you've done for him?  Don't be such a chump, or you'll end up an old maid."_

"Sayaka?  Are you awake now?"  Sayaka tilted her head and saw Kyousuke kneeling over her looking terrified.  "Oh, thank goodness!  I tried to call a nurse, but in all the chaos with that monster..."

            "Monster?"  Oh.  Oh, _no_.

            "It was insane!"  His voice sounded hoarse, as though he'd been screaming.  "First you passed out with no warning, then this giant, hideous mermaid thing appeared out of nowhere and started singing, and the song put me in some kind of magical trance until this girl appeared and kicked it in the face!  And then there was this other girl, and a woman with wings on her head, and they managed to get it out of the room, and from what I've been hearing outside I think they somehow ended up on the roof— Sayaka?"

            "I'm sorry!"  She had gotten to her feet as he spoke and was now edging toward the door.  "I have to—  Madoka.  Madoka was waiting for me outside the hospital.  I have to make sure she's okay."  She slipped out of the room, closed the door behind her, and broke into a run the moment she was out of his sight.

            What was wrong with her?  She still couldn't remember all of the details, but she knew that somehow she'd become a monster — a literal monster! — and attacked Kyousuke and endangered Madoka and countless other people.  Was there really _that_ much evil in her heart?

            Sayaka ducked into the stairwell.  She couldn't afford to wait for an elevator.  If Kyouskuke decided to try to follow her, she wanted to be as far ahead of him as she could get.  When her foot hit the first step below the landing, though, she froze.  A sudden impulse softly suggested she take the stairs up instead.  She remembered the time she sat with Kyousuke on the hospital roof and the way he looked at the fence surrounding it, as though idly calculating the time it would take to climb.  She remembered making the same calculations herself, in case she had to stop him.

            "Wait!" a voice suddenly echoed from somewhere above her.  "I don't understand any of this!  Please tell me what's going on!"

            A girl with lavender hair and an elaborate white-and-purple dress came barreling down the stairs.  She noticed Sayaka on the landing and pulled up just in time to keep from running into her.  A second girl, this one with a pink dress and long blonde twin tails, followed close on her heels.  She didn't manage to brake fast enough and ended up colliding with the girl in front of her, sending all three of them tumbling downward.

            Sayaka screamed.  The girl in pink screamed.  The girl in purple flung her arms out to grab the railings on both sides, caught the girl in pink against her back, and wrapped her legs around Sayaka's waist to catch her also.

            "Thank you, Sword-san," the girl in pink said as the three of them righted themselves.  "Um.  Sorry about that.  Oh, Sayaka-chan!  Thank goodness you're all right!"

            "Why are you chan-ing me?" Sayaka demanded.  Her heart was racing, and she could feel her face flushing.  Maybe her brains were kind of fried from the scare of nearly cracking her head open, or from her confused feelings over Kyousuke, but the way that Sword girl had just touched her was definitely having an effect on her body.  "And how do you know my name?"

            "What?"  The girl seemed surprised.  "Oh.  I guess I really do look different like this...  Sword-san, please wait!"

            Sword had pushed past Sayaka and continued her descent down the stairwell.  Sayaka reached out and grabbed her wrist to stop her.  "Oh no you don't!  I recognize both of you!  You were fighting me when I was transformed into a monster."

            Sword didn't turn to look at her, but her shoulders tensed.  Sayaka was suddenly struck by the sense she was holding a tiger by the tail.  "You remember that?"

            "Well, only vaguely," Sayaka admitted.  "But I _know_ you were there, and I'm not letting you leave until you explain why that happened to me!"

            "What can I explain?" asked Sword.  "The minions of King Selfish take the selfishness in human hearts and use it to create monsters.  If you remember what you were feeling in the moments before, you know better than I do why it happened."  She yanked her hand away, and Sayaka made no effort to stop her.

            "Then it really was my fault?" she asked quietly.

            "In a sense."

            "You're wrong about that," said the girl in pink.  "Sayaka-chan is the least selfish person I know.  Almost every day, she comes to visit her friend here to cheer him up.  She spends most of her own allowance money buying music that will make him happy."

            "Wait a minute..."  Her voice was familiar, Sayaka realized.  She turned back to take a closer look at her and nearly tumbled backwards again.  "Madoka?!"

            "Shhh!" said Madoka, grinning.  "It's 'Cure Heart' when I'm like this!"

            "Unbelievable."  Sword rounded on them.  "You reveal your identity just like that?"

            "It's all right, Sword-san," Madoka assured her.  "Sayaka-chan is my best friend."

            "All the worse, then.  If you're going to get other people involved in the affairs of Selfish Kingdom, you should at least be sure they're people you wouldn't mind losing."  Once again, she turned and headed down the stairs.  "Good luck.  I won't be responsible for either of you."

            "Wow," Sayaka said once she was out of earshot.  "Why are all of the coolest, most attractive girls complete psychos?  Present company excluded, of course."

            "I don't think she's a 'psycho'," Madoka said gently.  "She seems like there's something making her feel sad."

            "She seems like she doesn't care about other people at all!" Sayaka countered.

            "But she caught you, didn't she?"

            Sayaka had no response for that.

            "Oh!" Madoka exclaimed, breaking the silence.  "Is Kamijou-kun all right?"

            "He's fine," Sayaka said quickly.  "But that's boring to talk about.  Look at you!  You're a magical girl!  When did that happen?"

            "Um.  About fifteen minutes ago."  She sighed.  "And yet, somehow, it's a long story..."

—

            "So let me see if I can summarize," Sayaka said.  They had gone back to her place to talk in privacy, and were now sitting on the couch together, Sayaka eating cookies and Madoka cuddling Sharuru.  "Some creepy old man gave you a jewel clip, that pink rabbit you say is actually a fairy turned into a cellphone, you put the jewel clip _on_ the cellphone, and you became a magical girl?"

            "When you put it like that, it does sound a bit strange," Madoka admitted.

            "Is there another way to put it?"

             "Hurry up and tell her the rest of it, sharu!" Sharuru said.

            "What 'rest of it'?" Madoka asked.

            "This rest of it, keru!"  The blue fairy reached into Madoka's bag and pulled out another jewel clip like the one Madoka had shown her.  "We're looking for three Pretty Cure, and she was given three loveads.  Sayaka, since you're already up to speed on all this, form a partnership with me and become Pretty Cure!"

            For a moment, Sayaka's heart leapt.  Out of nowhere, this creature was offering to make her into a superhero.  She could protect people.  She could have magical adventures with her best friend.  Even with Kyousuke gone, she could feel like her life was worth something.  The moment she thought of Kyousuke, though, reality came crashing down on her.  "Sorry, but I can't."

            "Why not?"  Madoka asked.  "You've always been so much stronger and braver than I am.  I wouldn't be even a little bit afraid of the monsters if you were there fighting them with me."

            "Thank you for your kind words.  But magical girls are supposed to be pure-hearted heroines, right?  My heart is so far from pure, the bad guys were able to turn it into a monster."

            "I'm sure you don't have to be perfect to be Pretty Cure," Madoka said.  "I mean, look at me.  Look at Cure Sword."

            "I am looking.  You're the kindest person I've ever met.  And Cure Sword...  Well, I suppose 'pure-hearted' might not be the term for her, but even in the short time I met her for, I could tell that she's really strong and cool."

            "But you're all those things too, Sayaka-chan!"

            "You say that, but you're only basing it on the face I show to the rest of the world.  After today, you should know what I'm really like.  Deep down, I'm the monster that tried to kill you."

            Madoka squeezed Sharuru tightly to her chest.  "Sayaka-chan, please don't say that."

            "Why not?" Sayaka asked bitterly.  "It's the truth."

            "It is not, keru!"  Rakeru flew up so that he was face to face with her and pressed his tiny hands to his hips.  "The Selfish Kingdom is incredibly powerful!  They only need the slightest bit of darkness to turn a human heart into a Selfish."

            "That may be the case, but even so, I don't think _my_ 'darkness' is 'slight'.  I don't deserve the kind of power you're offering me."

            Rakeru threw his arms up.  "So stubborn, keru!"

            "That aside, I wonder how I'm going to take care of three baby fairies." Madoka sighed.  "It would have helped a lot if you'd been willing to take Rakeru, but there's no reason you would do that if you're not going to be involved."

            "Eh?!  Are you trying to get rid of me, keru?"  His eyes widened, and his floppy ears flew up in distress.  He looked so tiny and upset that Sayaka felt compelled to reach out and touch him.  She patted him on the head, then poked the little pink splotches on his cheeks and stretched his pout out into a smile.

            "I don't think any girl could want to get rid of such a little cutie," she told him.  "I don't mind you staying here with me, if it will help Madoka out.  Like Cure Sword said, I'm already 'involved' just by knowing about you."

            She removed her fingers, and Rakeru's smile stayed in place.  "Sayaka is so kind, keru!" he exclaimed.

            "Thank you, Sayaka-chan!" Madoka piped in before Sayaka could brush off the compliment.  "That helps a lot!"

            She beamed at her with such intense sweetness that if it were anyone else but Madoka, Sayaka would suspect she were being played for a chump.

—

            The music store was overflowing with people.  Sayaka approached the edges of the crowd, but could not see around them to what was going on inside.  "What's all this about?" she asked a girl her age standing in front of her.

            "Apparently Kenzaki Makoto is doing a signing here."  The girl did not look or sound happy about that.  "It's such a pain!  All these fans of hers are making a scene when I just want to get in and buy my music."

            "Geeze, that is annoying," Sayaka agreed.  "But I guess it can't be helped.  If it were one of my favorite artists, I would probably be doing the same thing."

            "Yeah, I guess I would too," the girl admitted.  "That sounded really selfish, didn't it?  Sorry for venting at you when you only wanted to know what was happening.  I just— ah!"  Her eyes widened and her whole body tensed.  Before Sayaka could ask what was wrong, she crumpled and collapsed to the ground.

            "Hey, someone call an ambulance!" Sayaka shouted.  "This girl just fainted!"  She kneeled down over the body and checked her vitals.  The girl was breathing just fine, but Sayaka couldn't find any sign of a pulse.  That wasn't right, was it?  If it was going to be one without the other, wasn't it usually the other way around?  Sayaka really, really hoped she was just doing a bad job of looking.  "Does anyone here know CPR?" she asked as she fumbled for her own cellphone.  Maybe someone else had listened to her and was already calling, but it never hurt to be sure.  "I think her heart might have stopped!"

            Those last words were drowned out by a monstrous roar and a chorus of frightened screams.  Suddenly, the crowd started to move, and Sayaka had to throw herself on her hands and knees over the girl lying prone to keep it from trampling her.  She tucked her chin to her chest to keep from getting kicked in the face, but there was no way of protecting her ribs from being bruised by all of the shins and knees colliding with them.  Someone grabbed her shoulder as though to try to help her up, but she shook them off and yelled at them to keep running.  Another person tripped over Sayaka and fell on top of her, knocking the breath out of her.  Her elbows buckled, but she straightened and locked them in place, straining to support the extra weight on her spine until it was removed with a hastily shouted apology.

            Only when the stampede cleared did she dare lift her head to look around.  Floating above her was a Selfish in the shape of an enormous pair of headphones.  Its angry black-lidded eyes narrowed at her, and its connector cord coiled like a snake about to strike.  The spear-like metal pin of the plug on the end glinted menacingly.

            Sayaka couldn't move.  If she did, the unconscious girl she was trying to protect would be exposed.

            "Selfish!" the monster roared, and shot out the bladed plug like a harpoon.  Sayaka cringed.  It almost sounded like an accusation.  The thoughts that had plagued her in the hospital stairwell had not returned since then, but facing down this Selfish now and seeing the terror it caused to everyone, she was ashamed of herself all over again for ever having become something like it.  _Maybe this is for the best_ , she thought.  _As I am now, do I even deserve to be alive?_

            A blur of lavender flashed through Sayaka's peripheral vision.  Suddenly, Cure Sword was in front of her, knifehanding the blade off its course.

            "Run," she told Sayaka, then screamed as the cord wrapped around her wrist and whipped her into the air.

            "Sword!" Sayaka shouted.  She found herself frozen in horror as the magical warrior struggled to break free, only to become more and more entangled in the wire.  Once she was thoroughly snared, the Selfish turned the tip of its blade toward her.  Sword managed to get her hands around the base of the plug and hold it at arm's length, but with the cord squeezing the breath from her body, her strength was quickly ebbing.  The blade gained ground inch by inch, until its point pressed into the hollow of her throat.

            "Sayaka!"  Sayaka looked down and saw Rakeru poking out of her bag where it had fallen on the ground.  He held up the lovead he had taken from Madoka.  "Will you fight with me, keru?"

            That was no kind of question at all.  There was absolutely no way Sayaka was going to watch someone die.

            From the moment her fingers closed around the lovead, they seemed to act of their own accord, expertly dashing out the unlock code on the device Rakeru transformed into.  She was struck by a chill like the winter wind, and a glare so bright she had to blink her eyes closed until it passed.  "The light of justice, Cure Diamond!" her own voice announced.

            Her clothes felt different.  Her _body_ felt different, tingling with something almost but not quite like adrenaline.  She had no time to look herself over, though, or even to think about it much.  Instead, she charged forward and leapt at the Selfish holding Cure Sword.

            She was already airborne when she realized she had no idea what she was doing.  Just jump-kicking the cord probably wouldn't accomplish much, and might even make Sword lose her grip.  What kind of powers did she even have?

            Ice.  Her power was ice.  Somehow, she just knew that.

            _"Somehow_ " _?_ she chastised herself.  _There's no "somehow" about it!  I'm a magical girl!_

_I can do this._

Sayaka balled her hand into a loose fist, and a blade of ice formed in her grip.  She brought it down on the Selfish's cord, severing it cleanly.  Cure Sword dropped to the ground and wriggled free of her slackened bonds.  Sayaka landed perfectly and painlessly on her feet — which was especially astonishing since, as she suddenly realized, she was wearing high-heeled boots. 

            "Selfish!" the monster snarled.  "Everyone should only care about the music _I_ like!"

            "Don't do anything you'll regret, now," Sayaka told it.  "I, Cure Diamond, will cool your head!"  She leaped at it again, makeshift sword raised, aiming for the center of the band.

            As she passed between its earpads, the Selfish unleashed a sonic blast at her from both directions, shattering her blade and sending her plummeting to the ground.

            "Sayaka!  Why didn't you use your finishing attack, keru?" Rakeru shouted from the love link.

            "Why didn't you tell me I _had_ a finishing attack?"  Sayaka's head was spinning, and her whole body felt bruised to the bone.  The Selfish lowered itself down over her and lashed what was left of its connector cord around her neck.  Sayaka's hands flew to her throat.  Her fingers scrambled desperately at the wire, but it was so thin and pulled so tight that she couldn't manage to hook them under it.

            "Cure Diamond, keep your head down!"  Cure Sword's voice rang out.

            Sayaka attempted to point out the obvious — that she didn't even have enough strength left to do otherwise — but the weak, voiceless whisper she managed to force from her lips was barely audible even to her own ears.

            "I will show you how it's done!  Flash, holy sword!"

            A flurry of shining white blades flew over Sayaka's head, nearly grazing her face as she lay on her back looking up at them.  The Selfish cried out as they struck it, and then vanished in a burst of light, allowing Sayaka to breathe again.

            "Thank goodness," she gasped.  Her arms wobbled with nerves and exhaustion as she struggled to push herself up to her knees.

            "You overdid it."  A purple-sleeved hand lowered into Sayaka's field of vision, and she didn't hesitate to take it.  Cure Sword's grip was almost crushingly firm as she hauled her to her feet.

            "Thank you," Sayaka said as she got her legs under her.

            "What happened?" asked a voice from behind her.  Sayaka turned and saw that the girl the Selfish had come from was also standing up.  "Where did everyone go?  And who are you?"

            "Some bad guys attacked and you fainted, but everything's okay now," Sayaka told her quickly.  "We're the legendary guardians of justice, Pretty Cure!"

            "'Bad guys'?  'Guardians of justice'?  Are you saying that a supervillain attacked the music shop?  What's going on here?"

            "I... don't really know," Sayaka admitted.  "Hey, Sword, what _is_ going on here?"  She received no answer, and when she turned to look, Cure Sword was already disappearing around the corner.  Sayaka felt her temper flare.  "Oh, come on!  I just saved her life!"  She went running after her, ignoring the other girl's further confused questioning.

            "Hey, aren't you going to talk to me?" Sayaka asked when she caught up with Sword.

            "I have nothing to say," Sword answered without breaking her gait.  "Do you?"

            "Um."  Sayaka thought about it.  All at once, she realized that she did, and her irritation was instantly doused.  "Sorry about last time."

            "'Last time'?"

            _If she doesn't remember, I could just not tell her,_ Sayaka thought, then instantly felt awful for thinking it.  "I was the mermaid," she blurted out just to spite herself.

            "I see.  I didn't recognize you."

            "So cold, keru," Rakeru commented from the love link.

            "Shh!" Sayaka told him.  "I'm the one apologizing,  so I don't have room to criticize."  She asked Cure Sword, "Are you angry at me?"

            "No.  But I don't need any apologies from my enemies' victims."

            "I wasn't just a victim, though," Sayaka reminded her.  "They used me to attack you.  None of it would have happened if my heart hadn't been so weak.  That monster... in a sense, it was my true self."

            Sword stopped and wheeled around so suddenly that Sayaka almost ran into her.  "Don't you dare say that!  The strongest woman I've ever known had to be rescued from turning into a Selfish.  One failure doesn't make you weak.  If you try to tell me otherwise, I won't forgive you!"

            "The boy I like was leaving for America to see a doctor there."  The words came tumbling out of Sayaka's mouth even as a detached little part of her mind listened to them in horrified confusion over her sudden compulsion to confess this to a near stranger.  She desperately wanted her apology to be acknowledged, and she was uncomfortable being told something so personal without offering anything in return.  "I wished for him to stay here with me, even though that might have meant the end of his life."

            "That does sound bad," Cure Sword admitted, and even though it was, in a sense, what she had wanted to hear, Sayaka felt her heart crumpling in on itself.  "However, I don't believe that our worst moments define us.  Your darkest thoughts are not your 'true self'.   Your sense of right and wrong is equally a part of you.  If that weren't the case, the Selfish Kingdom would not have targeted you.  Their magic is designed to exploit people who _suppress_ their selfish impulses, not those who easily give in to them."

            "Oh," was all Sayaka could manage to say in response.  It had never occurred to her to think of it like that.

            "I don't know why I'm talking to you when I said I wouldn't be responsible," Cure Sword muttered.  "You're just as troublesome as Cure Heart.  I thought the headphones girl was your friend, but if she were, you wouldn't have left her for so long just to chase after me.  Were you also going to throw your life away for a stranger?  Do neither of you value your lives at all?"

            "Ah!  I wasn't really thinking of it like that," Sayaka said quickly, waving her hands in front of her as though to ward off the accusation of selflessness.  "It's just that I was already trying to protect her from being trampled.  So to move out of the way just at the moment things got even more dangerous would have been...  Well, I didn't even think of it as a possibility."

            Cure Sword stared at her in surprise.  "You think like a soldier," she said, sounding as though it were the most astonishing revelation imaginable to her.  "I suppose I could... hm..."  She stroked her chin thoughtfully for a moment before asking, "Wait — were you here to see Makopi?"

            "Haha, what?"  The sudden change in topic was so startling that Sayaka could only laugh at it.  "No, actually, I didn't even know she was here.  To be honest, I'm not a big fan of her at all."

            "You aren't?"  Cure Sword's voice was, somehow, even flatter than usual.

            "Yeah, most of her music is too overproduced for my taste.  All of the overlapping tracks and that random anime sound effect noise disrupt the purity of the melodies and make the songs kind of annoying to listen to.  And I can't ever get over that 'one-two-three-four-fly!' part in 'Songbird'.  It sounds like it was written in just to show off her hitting a certain note, but then when the time comes she falls flat of it."

            "Ah."  Cure Sword's face was carefully expressionless.  Sayaka suddenly realized that she was almost certainly being a jerk to someone who loved Makopi's music so much she'd braved the crowd for her event.

            "I'm not saying she isn't talented," she added quickly.  "Actually, there's one song of hers I really like.  'Starry Sky,' I think it's called.  It's so lovely and subdued — and you know, somehow, I think she sounds more genuine singing about sadness and longing.  If she did more things like that, I probably would be a fan."

            "I see," Sword said, "you're someone with strong opinions on music.  Are you a musician yourself?"

            "I wish I could say I were, but no.  I tried for a bit when I was younger, but it ended with me getting frustrated and giving up."  Once she'd realized there was no hope she would ever be as good as Kyousuke, learning to play for herself just hadn't seemed as important as supporting him.

            "Try again," Sword told her, and the tone of her voice said that this was the end of their conversation for the day.  "Good bye."

            Sayaka watched her stride away with the uneasy feeling that she must have said something horribly, horribly wrong.

—

            "You knew this would happen," Sayaka accused Madoka.

            "Sayaka-chan, I can't see the future."  Madoka giggled.  "All right, I knew that because it's you, you would do the right thing if there was trouble.  And I wanted you to know that about yourself, too."

            "And 'Cure Rosetta'?" Sayaka teased.  "You pawned off Lance to an upperclassman you barely even knew because..?"

            "She found him when he got lost, and she seemed very responsible.  And very lonely."

            "Are you talking about your hostess behind her back?" Mami playfully scolded them as she emerged from the kitchen with a fresh tray of tartlets and tiny cakes.  "What rude house guests."

            Since the newest Cure lived alone, the three of them had decided that her place would be perfect for hosting what Mami called an "official strategy meeting" and Madoka referred to as a "Pretty Cure coming-together party".  Sayaka and Madoka now knelt at a low glass table while Mami served petit fours and English-style tea.  It would all have been very classy if Madoka hadn't taken the initiative of turning the radio on to her favorite station, filling the room with pop music as sugary as the pastries.

            "If it's a strategy meeting, we aren't 'guests' so much as 'allies'," Sayaka countered.

            "Perhaps so!" Mami said, setting the tray down on the table and taking a seat opposite them.  "Though I also have to concede that it's difficult to discuss strategy when we know so little about the nature of our battle."

            "If anyone knows what's really going on, it has to be Sword-san," Madoka said.  "Therefore, our 'strategy' should be to join up with her too, right?"

            "That's easier said than done," Mami pointed out.  "From what you two have told me about her, she sounds like a difficult person to get much out of."

            "To be honest, I didn't trust her at all at first," Sayaka said.  "But the last time I talked to her, for a moment, she seemed like she was really trying to be kind to me.  Then, suddenly—" she slapped her hands together "—nothing.  Is this 'tsundere'?  It's not as cute in real life as it is in anime."  Although, she refrained from adding out loud, it _was_ kind of maddeningly intriguing.

            "Miki-san, please relay to us your conversation with her in as much detail as you can remember," Mami urged her.  "Somewhere in there, we might find a clue to her identity."

            "Well," Sayaka said slowly, "it started with me chasing after her to apologize for the mermaid thing—"

            She was interrupted by the beginning of a new song on the radio.  _Songbird!  La la la la la la la la— One! Two!  Three!  Four!  Flyyyyyy!_

            "Oh man," Sayaka groaned, "now I _really_ hate this song.  Not only is it terrible and overplayed, but I think I may have gotten into a fight with Sword over it.  Dumb Makopi, ruining absolutely everything."

            "I like this song," Madoka said defensively, because of course she did.  "It's all right if you don't, but Sayaka-chan, please don't say unkind things about Makopi herself.  She's a good person.  I think it's really kind of her to give performances for kids at the hospital."

            "Sorry," said Sayaka, "I guess I shouldn't take my frustration out on someone who doesn't have anything to do with this.  Although actually, I didn't know that about the hospital performances."

            "Eh?  But you were there all the time," Madoka said.  "I thought you might even have seen her!  I never managed to when I hung around outside, but it would have been rude to go barging in just to look for her."

            "Oh come on!  Don't tell me the reason you waited for me all those times was actually—"  Sayaka's train of thought collided with the cliff-face of sudden realization.  "Wait a minute.  You mean she performed at _that_ hospital?  Regularly?"  Madoka nodded.  "Did I not tell you guys where I met Cure Sword the second time?"

            "Outside a music shop, correct?" Mami asked.  She smiled knowingly, because even with much less information, she was apparently quicker on the uptake than Sayaka.  Life wasn't fair.  "Perhaps you left out a relevant detail or two?"

            Sayaka slammed her face down on the table.  "I've been _such_ an idiot," she mumbled morosely into the glass.

—

            "Um," Sayaka said to Makoto after the latest Selfish had been defeated, "sorry about last time.  Again."

            "I am a professional," Makoto answered huffily.  "I can handle criticism."

            "Can you handle answering an apology?" Sayaka asked, bristling.  This girl's bad habits were really getting on her nerves.  "Or any kind of basic polite human interaction?"

            "Sayaka-chan, please be nice," Madoka begged her.  "Makopi is part of the team now!"

            "I don't recall agreeing to that," Makoto said.  Madoka's face fell.

            "Would you give it a rest?" Sayaka snapped at her.  "We all know you're not really like this.  That's not the idol who gives free concerts to sick kids, or the cool magical girl who talked me into believing in myself.  Madoka really admires you, so stop being a jerk to her.  The truth is, she had your number from the beginning."  She extended her hand to Makoto.  "Just make it official already and let her have her complete collection of sad and lonely girl misfits.  You do know that's the inevitable outcome of this magical girl thing, right?"

            Makoto was silent for a moment as she looked from Sayaka to Madoka to Mami, and then back to Sayaka.  At last, she reached out and took the hand offered to her.  Her grip was less firm than when she had helped Sayaka to her feet after their first battle together, more clinging than crushing.  She stood there awkwardly for a few seconds, as though touching for the sake of touching rather than any practical purpose was so new to her that she wasn't sure when to let go.

            "It's an honor to fight beside you, Kenzaki-san," said Mami.

            "I'm so glad everyone is all together!" said Madoka.

            "As am I," said a strange voice.  All four girls looked up, and Sayaka felt her eyes widen at the sight of an older man with the diminutive bat-like wings marking an agent of Selfish Kingdom floating just above them.  "It would have been too much trouble to hunt you down one-by-one.  Farewell, Pretty Cure."  He snapped his fingers, and the ground opened up beneath them.

—

            Cure Sword's home world lay in ruins.  A war had happened here, and everyone was dead or worse.   Madoka sat rapt with horror as she told her story.  Mami stood off to the side staring vacantly into the distance.  Sayaka was angered and agitated.  She tried to listen politely, but eventually had to get up and start pacing to ameliorate the burning need to do _something_ besides sitting helplessly still.  It was either that or clawing up her own arms.

            "Well, we're here now," she said when Makoto had finished.  "So let's find our fairy partners and start purifying everyone right away!"

            "That doesn't exactly strike me as tactically sound," Mami said.

            "Why not?" Sayaka argued.  "I know we're outnumbered, but think about it!  The more people we save, the more reinforcements we'll have, right?"

            "Reinforcements from where?" Makoto asked.  "I don't see any unconscious bodies lying around here, do you?"

            She didn't.  Sayaka's heart sank.  She wasn't exactly sure what that meant, but it couldn't possibly be a good thing.

            "Where did they go?" Madoka asked quietly.

            "I don't know," Makoto said.  "I suppose it would make sense if the agents of Selfish Kingdom had locked them away somewhere."

            "Unless..." Mami began slowly.  "Kenzaki-san, what happens to a Selfish whose human body is destroyed?  If it continued to exist, what would happen if it were purified?"

            "I don't know," Makoto repeated.  She turned away and buried her face in her hands.

            Everyone was silent.  Slowly, hesitantly, Sayaka walked up behind Makoto and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder.  A part of her wanted to wrap her arms around the other girl's waist and pull her close, but she had never been brave enough with Kyousuke, and she wasn't brave enough now.  Makoto went rigid, but did not pull away.  "We'll find her," Sayaka promised.  "We're sure to eventually, if we don't give up.  As long as we keep fighting, we're slowing the bad guys down and getting stronger ourselves.  When we're strong enough, or when we've found the Queen to help us, we'll destroy King Selfish, and then we'll have all of the time in the world to figure out how to get everyone back to normal.  We're magical girls, so we must have some way of fixing a problem caused by magic, right?  Is _that_ a 'tactically sound' plan, Mami-san?"

            "It's a workable outline of one," Mami said encouragingly.

            "It's just like Sword-san said," Madoka added.  "'As long as we have hope, a kingdom can be rebuilt,' right?  Makopi, don't forget your own words."

            "Everyone..." Makoto began.

            She was cut off by a chorus of croaks as a horde of frog-shaped Selfish emerged from the waters at the base of the structure the girls were taking shelter in.

            It was strange:  for a moment, Sayaka forgot to run.  For a while now, her fight-or-flight instinct had been set permanently to "fight," so with that no longer an option, she simply froze up.  It was Makoto who reminded her what to do by grabbing her and shoving her ahead of herself.

            The only way out of the building led to a high bridge, and the bridge had crumbled right in the middle.  Sayaka saw Madoka's speed faltering as she noticed it, but Mami charged ahead, leapt the gap, landed gracefully, and spun around to face them.  "There we have it, then!" she called out with determined good cheer.  "It's possible!"

            Madoka made the jump next, and Sayaka followed after her.  As she landed, she heard Makoto gasp behind her, and turned to see the far edge of the bridge crumbling under the other girl's feet as she leapt.  Her arms windmilled in the air, reaching desperately to catch hold of something, anything that could save her.

            She wasn't going to make it.  She was going to fall just short.  Sayaka could see it clearly.  She reached for her anyway.  Her fingertips came within a hair's breadth of brushing Makoto's — and then the distance began to widen.

            Sayaka leapt from the bridge, and it closed again.

            Her fingers wrapped around Makoto's wrist.  In another instant, her whole body jolted, her limbs nearly wrenched out of their sockets.  Madoka and Mami had caught her, and now she was dangling by her ankles, body stretched uncomfortably taut by gravity and Makoto's weight.  For a heroic leap of faith, it wasn't particularly dignified.  But it would have to do.

            "What are you doing?!" Makoto shouted at her.  "Let go of me and save yourself!"  There was a sort of wild despair in her voice that was all too familiar to Sayaka.

            "'One failure doesn't make you weak,'" Sayaka repeated back to her. "You were thinking of your queen when you said that, right?  And you're thinking of her now.  Doing what she did won't fix anything.  Fighting until you win will."

            "This doesn't concern you!"

            "Of course it concerns me!  I am the legendary soldier of justice, Cure Diamond, and the whole world needs me!  That's why, since the last time you asked me, I've decided:  I do value my life."

            "You have a strange way of showing it," Makoto muttered.

            "I trusted my friends to catch me."  Sayaka managed a strained smile.  "It's normal to help the people you care about, isn't it?"

            Makoto's eyes widened.  Looking into them, Sayaka felt as though she could almost read the other girl's thoughts.  She was afraid of having people who cared about her — afraid that she would lose them again, afraid that she didn't deserve it.

            "If you let go now," Sayaka told her firmly, "you will _never_ find her."

            Makoto's expression hardened.  She pulled her dangling arm up and wrapped it around Sayaka's wrist, clinging to life with her own strength.

            Slowly, laboriously, Mami and Madoka hauled both of them back onto the bridge.  The four of them managed to crawl a little further away from the edge, then kneeled panting in exhaustion.  Madoka hugged everyone and babbled effusively about how glad she was they were all safe.

            In a fit of death-defying exhilaration, Sayaka hugged Makoto as well.  Maybe it was just because she had already used up all her shock and indignation on Madoka, but Makoto's only response was to lean into her and rest her head on Sayaka's shoulder.  Sayaka felt the other girl's breath against her neck, and a not at all unpleasant tingling sensation ran down her spine.

            She was almost disappointed, once she got her wind back, to have to untangle herself and clamber to her feet to continue the trek toward the castle.

—

            "Diamond!  Sword!" Madoka called out.  "There's a shard of the mirror that still works!"

            "Great!" Sayaka shouted.  She aimed a kick for Bel's windpipe.  He managed to dodge it, but only by backing right into Makoto's fist between his shoulder blades.  "That means we don't need this bastard!"  She summoned her ice sword into existence and lunged.

            Bel was panting heavily, but his reflexes were still sharp.  He clapped his hands together in front of his chest, catching Sayaka's blade between them.  The tip was less than an inch away from piercing his breast.  He was clearly as exhausted as they were.  Makoto stood her ground behind him, pummeling his back in an attempt to drive him forward.  If only Sayaka could summon just a little more strength, they could put an end to one of the biggest threats they faced right now, as well as exact some small measure of justice for Trump Kingdom.  She dug her feet into the floor, screamed out a battle cry, and _pushed._

            Bel lifted her up and threw her into the fallen chandelier.

            Splinters of broken crystal embedded themselves in the backs of her arms and legs.  She struggled shakily to her feet, only to collapse again before she could charge back into the fray.  Mami and Madoka caught her.  Makoto feinted past Bell and ran to her side.

            "Makoto, I'm sorry," Sayaka gasped out.  "Your home... Your friends..."

            "We'll get stronger," Makoto told her.  "In the end, we _will_ win.  I'm absolutely sure of it, now that you've shown me that I'm not alone.  Thank you, Sayaka."

            Sayaka opened her mouth to argue, but then closed it again, swallowed her objection, and nodded.  If Makoto could take an apology, she could take a compliment.

            The four them jumped through the mirror and emerged safely in Mitakihara.

—

            "You wanted to show me something?"  Makoto stood on Sayaka's doorstep, still dressed in her Mitakihara Middle School uniform.  Walking home together hadn't quite worked out the way they'd planned, what with the horde of rabid fans loitering around the school entrance and the elaborate stratagems they'd had to employ to avoid them.  Eventually they'd split up, Sayaka taking Makoto's hat to lead their pursuers astray.

            "I did," Sayaka said.  A perverse little part of her had been beginning to hope that Makoto would want to just head home to rest after all that excitement, giving Sayaka an excuse to not go through with what she had planned.  Thinking that didn't necessarily make her a coward, though.  There was still plenty of time to be brave.  "Come on up to my room."

            When they got there, Makoto took a seat on Sayaka's bed — which, Sayaka reminded herself, was a perfectly normal thing for friends to do.  "Ever since our second meeting, I've been working on something," she explained as she dug out her violin case and opened it up.  "Because you were the one who drove me to it, I wanted to show you first."

            There was no backing out now.  Sayaka straightened up, lifted the violin to her chin, turned to face Makoto, and began sawing out an arrangement she hoped was recognizable as "Starry Sky's Way Home".

            Makoto sat very still as she played, her expression unreadable.  Watching her made Sayaka nervous, so she closed her eyes and did her best to just focus on the sound of the music.  Of course, when she did that, it was even easier to hear every little mistake she made.  Since Makoto was a musician herself, she would almost certainly be hearing the same things.   Sayaka had considered practicing in front Madoka, who would think her playing was wonderful no matter what.  She didn't want that, though.  She wanted someone who would notice the flaws and tell her whether her effort had been worthwhile even with them.

            Partway through the second verse, Sayaka noticed that Makoto was humming along.  When Sayaka hit the refrain, she began to sing under her breath.  Sayaka opened her eyes to watch her, which Makoto must have taken as a sign that she was doing something wrong, because she instantly fell back into polite silence.  Sayaka smiled at her though, and nodded slightly in her direction.  Makoto took the cue to start singing again — tentatively at first, then with something more like her full voice, though still quietly enough that the music took center stage.

            They finished the song together.  When it was over, Sayaka set the violin down and laughed off her lingering nerves.  "I guess that means you liked it well enough?  Unless you were just trying to cover up for my mistakes."

            "I did like it," Makoto assured her.  "If you only started practicing again a few months ago, you must have been working very hard."

            Sayaka had been.  It was nice to hear someone acknowledge that.  "It's really scary playing for other people," she said.  "Honestly, I can't even begin to imagine how you manage to sing in front of whole crowds of strangers."

            "I was nervous at first myself," Makoto told her.  "But I wanted my queen to hear me.  I was singing for her."  Something about Sayaka's face on hearing that must have given her away, because Makoto's eyes widened.  "Sayaka?"

            "I've been having selfish thoughts again,"  Sayaka confessed.  "I don't like Jonathon Klondike any more than you do, but when he said he was engaged to the queen, my first thought was, 'Maybe now I have a chance.'  I felt awful when I saw how sad you were."  Seeing that side of Makoto for the first time had been a bit of shock.  Up until then, Sayaka had been thinking of Cure Sword as someone otherworldly and impossibly mature, a tragic heroine who had suffered through and survived enormities Sayaka would never be able to fully comprehend.  All of that was still true, to an extent, but she was also an awkward teenage girl with a hopeless first love who made faces at her romantic rival over the tea she spitefully refused to accept from him.

            "You shouldn't.  It was foolish of me from the beginning."  Makoto looked down.  "She's several years older than me, so looking back, it seems likely she never saw me as anything more than a child.  And she is a queen.  Queens need heirs."

            Sayaka drew closer to Makoto.  "None of that changes how you feel about her.  I _know_ that feelings aren't so easily reasoned away."  She smiled self-depreciatingly.  "Which I guess is why I can't help liking you."

            "I like you too," Makoto said softly, still not looking at her.  She blushed just like the schoolgirl she was dressed as.

            Sayaka, who had spent far too much time preparing herself to deal with rejection, suddenly realized she had no idea what to do next.  If they were at school she could ask Makoto to go out with her somewhere later, but since the two of them were already together in her room, that seemed like a huge step in the wrong direction.  Should she try kissing her?  That would probably be moving a bit fast, especially since Makoto was currently sitting on her bed.  After a moment of panicked mental flailing, she settled on reaching out to take Makoto's hand in hers, lacing their fingers together.  Makoto lifted her head, eyes wide as they looked into Sayaka's.  Sayaka realized she didn't have much of an idea what to do either, and suddenly felt infinitely better about everything.

            Without breaking eye contact, Makoto pulled Sayaka's hand closer to her and pressed her lips against the knuckles.  Sayaka's heart fluttered and her face flushed.  Makoto must have noticed, because the corners of her mouth curled into a just-barely-visible smile.  Awkward teenage girl or no, Makoto was still a gallant magical knight.

            _As am I, now_ , Sayaka reminded herself.  She pulled Makoto up to her feet, wrapped an arm around her waist, and went in for a proper kiss — which turned out to not be much more than a peck on the lips, but it was a gallant peck.


End file.
